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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I have an only child who my everything. My child is a toddler and approaching an age where if I’m going to have another child it needs to be now for them to really be arguably close in age. What does everyone think about having an only child verse two children? Any thoughts and feedback much appreciated.  [b]I am looking for exclusively the perspective of The benefits it would have on my child.[/b] (not necessarily for my benefit)[/quote]

Well do you want your child growing up to think they are someone's everything, that they always are first pick, that they are always the most important and then go out into the real world with that mindset. Or do you want them to learn compromise, negotiating, that life isn't always fair, how to get along with others, etc.[/quote]

A sibling isn’t necessarily going to fix this. [/quote]

My cousin is who is an only child was the most spoilt and entitled child I knew and grew up to be an entitled, spoilt adult. She was their everything, center of their world, the sun, moon, and stars.  However I agree that if she had had a sibling, both kids would probably have been treated that way to some extent.[/quote]

I do a lot of volunteering with kids and have seen dozens and dozens of family dynamics over the years. Selfish, spoiled children are a result of bad parenting, not the number of siblings they have. I know kids with those traits and IMO, their siblings seem to make them double down with those tendencies. The parents encourage possessiveness and "fairness" and it makes the competitive and un-generous. I also know only children that are the least selfish and most compromising kids in the room, because they have never had to compete for resources and don't see life as a zero sum game. Personally, I think if I lived in a rural area, I'd be more inclined to give a child a sibling or two. But in an urban area like the DMV, kids have plenty of neighbors and extracurricular activities if they want them. I think the best family set up in this area is the one that makes the parents happiest and most able to be calm, stable, involved parents. Life in this area is hard and demanding, and adding more kids because you "should" is not always a net positive for the family and the kid's childhood experience. [/quote]

In my cousin's case it was about her being an only child. They had fertility issues and this was their one and only and they worshipped her and tried to give her everything. They were  older parents (40s) and she was the center of their world. They catered to her as a child to the extremes. They were focused on wanting her to be happy and whatever she needed / wanted to be happy - they gave her. In many ways they were great parents - she had every opportunity in the world and the undivided attention of doting parents but all that attention and focus on her as a child who could truly do no wrong made her spoiled and entitled. [/quote]

I would also gently suggest that you may be biased and not be getting a full picture of what went on with your cousin or her parents. I say this because it happened to me.

Growing up, I had two cousins who were onlies. I remember disliking these two cousins, feeling they were entitled, and ascribing it to them being only children. I also remember my mom and aunts often tut-tutting about how those kids were spoiled, didn't learn to share, how sad it was they didn't have siblings ("go play with your cousins Larla, she's always all alone") etc. I have three siblings and I grew up thinking that only kids were generally spoiled and entitled like I perceived my cousins to be.

But a few years ago, shortly after I'd had my first baby who would also turn out to be my last, my mom made a comment to me about one of those cousins. She said something along the lines of "she created a monster", referring to her sister raising her only child. And I was a bit taken aback and honestly confused because all these years later, I don't consider that cousin (or my other only child cousin) to be a monster at all. We're all in our 40s now (I was still in my 30s at the time this happened) and they have settled into mid-life with pretty decent lives. The cousin she was referring to is married, has kids, sees his parents a lot. I remember when he was younger he was kind of aimless, took a while to figure out what he wanted after college, and struggled a bit to get used to caring for himself. I do think my aunt probably doted on him too much and did too much for him once he was a teen/young adult because that transition was tough for him. But he's not a monster, at all, and I actually think most people who meet him would think him to be quite successful at life -- good job, good family, functional relationships, and he has a good personality and plenty of friends.

What I realized when my mom said that is that a lot of the narrative around my only child cousins had been handed to me by people who were pretty biased. Another thing about these cousins -- their parents were more financially stable than my parents or some of their siblings, their parents didn't really stress about college and even paid for grad school in both cases because they had the funds and it was, after all, their only child. I think some of what my mom and her sisters said was based on truth -- my one aunt, at least, really did struggle with saying no to her kid sometimes -- but I think a lot of it was based on envy and resentment.

And I'm also realizing that maybe what I perceived as selfishness or entitlement as a kid... wasn't. I came from a big family, was a middle child, and as an adult I've discovered I have a lot of issues related to some neglectful behaviors from my parents that were at least in part due to the fact that they had a lot of kids and simply overlooked some of my needs in the mix. I was a very insecure kid and viewed resources as scarce and all my siblings and I were/are very competitive about stuff like parental attention. I now think it's possible my cousins weren't actually selfish or entitled, but just secure. And that read as very entitled to me, a deeply insecure child who never felt like I got enough attention or emotional support. This really struck me as my mom was complaining about how my cousin was a "monster" (a demonstrably false statement) due to my aunt's parenting, when of course my parents were also flawed parents and I know that better than anyone.

I had it totally wrong. I think it's possible you might have it at least partially wrong, too. There might be some truth to it, but were your parents perfect? All parents mess some stuff up. Unless your cousin is now committing financial fraud, stealing from children, never gives money to charity, and friendless and miserable because of her terrible, selfish, entitled personality, it's probably that the narrative around your cousin being spoiled beyond all help is an exaggeration intended to make certain people feel superior about themselves.[/quote]

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